Jin Kou Jue Chart
Jin Kou Jue shares its origin with Da Liu Ren but reduces the structure to four positions. Once they are set, the elemental relations and seasonal strengths can be read immediately, which is what the tradition means by casting and reading in one motion. This page explains where each position comes from.
The four positions
The whole cast consists of four places: the ground, the general, the noble and the human stem. The ground is the footing; the general is placed above it, the noble above the general, and the human stem is drawn out from the noble. The four stack into a single column, and the entire reading rests on the relations within it.
Where Da Liu Ren rotates both plates, takes four lessons and derives three transmissions, this system takes only the one column. A simpler structure does not mean looser derivation — with only four positions, none of them can be taken casually.
Taking the ground position
This is the step that most distinguishes the system. The ground is taken from the actual direction at the moment of casting, usually where the enquirer stands or the direction indicated, with the twelve branches mapped to twelve directions. Alongside the direction, what the enquirer does and whatever sounds or objects present themselves are recorded as external correspondences.
Writing the circumstances of the casting into the formal rules is unusual. In other systems such correspondences are at most corroborating evidence; here they fix the ground position, and so the starting point of the entire cast.
General, noble and human stem
The general is derived by placing the month general on the hour and reading what falls above the ground — the same principle that rotates the heaven plate in Da Liu Ren. The noble is found by starting the Noble One from the day stem, laying out the twelve generals, and taking the one above the general. The human stem is then drawn from the palace the noble occupies.
Each position carries an element: the ground and general from their branches, the noble from the general assigned to it, and the human stem is a stem outright. The relations among the four, together with the Six Relatives reckoned from the day stem, form the body of the reading.
Strength, void and the Six Relatives
With the four set, strength is assessed first: each position is weighed against the season of the casting across five grades. Strength decides how much weight a position carries, so the same relation reads differently depending on whether the position is thriving or exhausted.
Void branches are determined by the ten-day cycle the casting day falls in, and a position that falls void is handled separately. The Six Relatives are assigned from the day stem as self, mapping abstract elemental relations onto concrete categories of affairs in the same way Liu Yao does.
How to use it
- Fix the ground position from the direction at the moment of casting, noting the external correspondences
- The general is placed from the month general and hour, the noble started, and the human stem drawn out
- Read the elemental relations, seasonal strength and Six Relatives across the four positions